Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier reiterated his plea to narrow the state's insanity defense statute after a 40-year-old man allegedly stabbed a woman in the back at a Barnes & Noble bookstore in Palm Beach Gardens last week. The woman, 65-year-old Rita B. Loncharich, later died after being transported to St. Mary’s Medical Center in West Palm Beach from her injuries.
"Red states must eliminate tragedies like this. It’s why I have urged the Florida Legislature to narrow the “insanity defense” so that it can no longer be abused to release violent criminals," Uthmeier wrote on social media. "If you brutally murder someone, you must face the death penalty or be locked up forever.
According to multiple outlets, Antonio Moore attacked the woman after an "internal buildup" caused a "fight or flight" response in the bookstore just before 8 p.m. on Dec. 22. He then took a knife out of his jacket and stabbed Loncharich in the back. She was the closest person to him in the store.
Moore, who was homeless and came from Georgia to Florida by bus about a week before, reportedly admitted to not knowing the victim or having a motive in the attack.
He was apprehended after the attack by local authorities without incident about 1,500 feet from the scene. Moore was charged with first-degree premeditated murder in the stabbing.
Uthmeier vowed to reform the state's insanity defense after a man who stabbed a six-year-old child more than 20 times to death was acquitted of capital murder by reason of insanity by a Kentucky jury in 2018.
"Alleging that you can't tell right from wrong should not exonerate you from a violent crime," Uthmeier said in a video statement at the time. "Moral incompacity should only be used during sentencing to determine if someone should spend the rest of their life in prison, or in a high-security hospital. We cannot allow what happened in Kentucky to ever occur in Florida."
